House keeping

I just uploaded a bunch of pics from Australia onto flickr while in the airport...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ourdreamlist/

We are on our way to Argentina now.

Cheers

Ryan

Video from our 11 dives on the great barrier reef, Cairns, Australia

Part 1 of 3:



Part 2 of 3:



Part 3 of 3:




Bubble ... Bubble ... Bubble

Video from New Years Eve in Sydney

Part 1 of 3:



Part 2 of 3:



Part 3 of 3:




Enjoy...

Ryan

Videos

OK, so the 2 videos I just uploaded are too long for youtube, so they have been removed. I will edit them and re-upload as soon as I can.

Cheers

Ryan

The Rock and the Reef

Hi All,

Our trip to Australia would not have been complete with out a trip to Uluru (Ayer's Rock) or the great barrier reef.  Uluru is the aboriginal name for Ayer's Rock.  

Uluru

We flew into Alice Spring and drove 4.5 hours to our hotel just out side Uluru National Park. We had fun on the drive and the scenery was amazing, the bright oranges and deep reds of the outback contrasted beautifully against the blue sky.  (However if you plan to make this trip on your own be sure to secure a rental car with unlimited miles.  We could not find one but we know others who had and unfortunately our over milage allowance at the end was quite large.)   We arrived in time to see the sunset over the rock and woke early the next day to to see the sun rise.  We went back to our back packer hotel where we made our selves breakfast, took a little nap and then went back to the rock for a few hikes.  Unfortunately we could not climb the rock because the heat and high winds had caused that hike to close, but we enjoyed the many other hikes around the rock for an up close view of the crevices, water holes and aboriginal rock paintings.  We also ventured right next door to the Olgas (I can't remember their aboriginal

name).

This unique sandstone formation, has 22 separate round domes that just just right out of the earth.  We did a few hikes here too then headed back to the hotel for a well deserved swim.  We loved the natural beauty of the sight.  It amazed us how flat everything was yet there out of nowhere, sprang Uluru and the Olgas.

The Great Barrier Reef

As some of you know Ryan and I like to scuba dive, so as with most scuba divers the great barrier reef is another dream.  We spent 3 days and 2 night on a dive boat with about 18 other divers on the outer reef.  We did a total 11 dives, two of which were night dives and it was amazing.  Living in Missouri we don't get to dive as much as we would like so this was chance to really get into it.  After the first few dives Ryan and I were able to perfect our underwater buddy communication and spend a good deal of time under water appreciating the totally different world down bellow.  We found Nemo, a lion fish, sharks, turtles, eals and allot of other bright beautiful fishes and coral.   It was some of the best diving we have done and we got to meet some great people.  Our new friend's Donna and Gary even were nice enough to share their video of the dives with us.  

Well that is it for now next we are off to Chile.  We will be home soon and I hope to see you all soon.

bye for now,

D

Among the First to Ring in the New Year

Hi All,

It has always been a dream of Ryan's to be in Sydney to celebrate New Years.  As child he watched all of the world's cities different celebrations on the TV.  Sydney, always being the first was his favorite.  Now, I and 1.5 million other people have had the opportunity to share in his dream and it was awesome!!!  We had done our research and scouted out the perfect location, Mrs. Mac Guire's Chair, in the Botanical Garden, however everything we had learned indicated we needed to get an early start.   Sydney gates off all of the major viewing sites, and only opens them up at certain times so, crowds can be regulated, bags can be checked etc.. We got to our gate at 8:30 am, we knew there would be a line, but we never expected it to be that long so soon.  At 10 am our gates opened and we began inching our way to the opening.  Finally at 1:30 pm, we made it through the gate.  We ran hoping there would still be room for us in the free reserved section along the water front (only 3000 of the 25000 people for our site were allowed in the reserved section).  We were lucky enough to be last people to make it!!!!  We put down our blanket to insure a view of the city, the opera house and the harbor bridge and then cracked open our cooler to have cold drinks and some lunch.  It was a long hot day but we were well rewarded with the best free view of the fireworks.  

HAPPY NEW YEAR, 2009 is looking good so far!

St. Some Where

OK, OK... so St. Some where is actually St. No Where because our day trip was to Port Stephens. No St. in the name anywhere. Yeah I know some times I don't pay the closest of attention. Anyways it was a good time. We were on a large boat, but the dolphins were really friendly and loads came right up to the boat. If I had arms slightly longer than Ryan I could have just reached out and touched them. Unfortunately our pictures were the best because as Ryan would say the our camera's "technology" was just not good enough. I think it is not the camera, its the photographer, he needs to anticipate. The problem is he really wants a new big super fast and fancy Nikkon. I think I will have to give in when when we have kids. After the dolphins we went 4 wheeling in the sand dunes, in some military style hard core 4 wheelers. It was really fun but I thin they could have pushed it just a bit further. We finished our sand dune adventure with sand boarding. Because of the high probability of injures they do not let you go down on your feet proper boarding style, instead it is more like sleding. It was really fun and super fast but the climb back up the dune and the sand in places I care not to talk about it might just be why the sport has not gone main stream like snow boarding.

Happy Holidays from Down Under

It has been a while since I wrote a blog, but Ryan has monopolized all the computer time. I have nicked named him the internet monster.
We are having a great time in Australia. For once the weather has started to co-operate and the sun is shining. We spent the first couple of days exploring the city, the Opera House, Art Museum, Botanical Garden, Harbor Bridge, Bondi Beach etc.... We even met up with some some of our friends from the China trip for lunch one day. The Opera house was great. As some of you know Ryan and I really appreciate modern architecture, so to see it up close was a true high light. All of the angles and the way the white iridescent tiles on the roof catch the light at different times of day was amazing. Ryan was also really impressed by the harbor bridge and of course the harbor. I enjoyed the botanical garden, Ryan tolerated it. The rose garden was small but still nice. The best part it that it is a free open park with great plants and trees all along the harbor with an amazing view of both the opera house and the bridge. (We hope to be able to get a spot there for the new years firework extravaganza.) We spent Christmas on the beach, still not used to the southern hemisphere thing of a bbq on the beach, but it was nice to get some sun after all the rain in Asia.

We spent the first part of today, Boxing Day, at Watson's cove which is right next to the southern Head of Sydney harbor, so we could watch the Sydney to Hobart boat race. We walked around the cove and then walked up the head so we had a better view of the start. It was cool to see all the sail boats jocking back in forth for the best starting position with harbor bridge in the back ground. We then walked to the ocean side of the head so we could see the boats race into the ocean for the sail to Hobart. Ryan was so happy.

We are planning a day trip tomorrow to St. Somewhere (can't remember the name) the Dolphins are suppose to be abundant. We are taking a boat tour, followed by 4 wheeling and sand boarding in the sand dunes, with even a stop at a wildlife sanctuary on the way home. (Yea!! koalas and kangaroos) I want to learn to surf here and I would love to go sailing the harbor with Ryan. We have not made it to Carins of Alice springs yet, so no reef diving and no big rock yet, but that is planned to come. I am sure Ryan or maybe even I (if I get a chance) blog about that later.

A digital christmas present :-)

Hey all, just got done using the free wifi at the apple store (wicked fast) to catch up on my video and picture uploads. Check out the following for all the goodies:

Flickr

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ourdreamlist/sets/

YouTube

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=E1FBED7FCC399470

Cheers, and happy Christmas.

PS. We got to watch the start of the Sydney to Hobart boat race today, it was awesome!

Merry Christmas!

Hey all, just a quick merry Christmas to all of you from D and I in Sydney, Australia. We plan to spend Christmas day tomorrow on Bondi Beach with the rest of Sydney. Hope you all have a great day and get lots of presents.

Love Ryan and D